Scania rolls out assistance offers for new truck buyers

Scania has announced a number of new truck ownership packages to help ease the Covid-19 burden for buyers.

Scania says the series of offers around its New Truck Generation range have been developed to combat the negative impacts of the coronavirus crisis for customers.

"Scania is pro-actively reaching out to truck buyers and offering them solutions for new vehicle acquisition and pain-free servicing designed to maximise uptime and cash-flow especially during challenging times," says Scania Trucks director of sales Dean Dal Santo.

"We understand that increased cost pressures brought to bear by the coronavirus crisis require urgent action. Working in conjunction with Scania Finance Australia (SFA), we have developed the initiatives targeting selected short lead time vehicle purchases.

"This program has been designed to have immediate impact, making it possible for operators to renew their fleet or continue with planned fleet replacements as well as maintain the vehicles in prime condition.

"One of the motivators was the further tightening of lending criteria by the major financial institutions which may make it unduly onerous for some customers to be able to complete a much-needed purchase.

"So Scania has expanded its already well received ‘low doc’ loan programme. We also promise a fast decision on a loan request, again to reduce the pressure on customers keen to get on the road in a new truck."

In the short term, the truckmker says it will help customers to maximise the financial advantage of the federal government’s stimulus package, Backing Business Investment (BBI), which includes the instant asset write-off or 50% accelerated depreciation for investment programmes.

The first intiative, Dal Santo explains, is to increase the loan limit for existing customers of SFA to $750,000, or $500,000 for customers new to SFA.

"In addition, we are offering a limited period of six months of interest-only payments for the vehicle and also a deferred payment offer for repair and maintenance agreements on these selected new vehicles," he says.

"These are carefully considered offers aimed at ensuring customers who may be looking at restricted cashflow for reasons completely outside their control, can continue to function with a higher degree of normality than they may have thought possible.

"Scania’s network of nine company-owned workshops and parts branches across Australia ensures we remain closely aligned with our customers’ uptime focus and despite the impact of the coronavirus across Australian business, we have maintained full capacity at our branches.

"Our technicians, parts advisers, warehouse staff and account managers have all been and continue to be available as usual to ensure we support our customers when they need it most," Del Santo explains.

Customers ordering selected short lead time vehicles before 30 September 2020 and taking delivery before 31 December 2020 will be able to take advantage of the offers.